


Sisters of Winter Wastes

by Aurya



Category: Final Fantasy XIII, Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-10
Updated: 2019-05-10
Packaged: 2020-02-29 11:02:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18776953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aurya/pseuds/Aurya
Summary: Hidden in the shadows of the Augur's Quarter, Lightning meets a pale woman muttering a fragment of familiar words. She asks - without a word of introduction - that Lightning help find her sister, who has gone missing after having left for the Slaughterhouse. It would be well worth the time to aid these familiar faces.





	Sisters of Winter Wastes

**Author's Note:**

> Finally got around to playing Lightning Returns again, and good night did I underestimate my preparations. Left all the multi-day quests to Day 6 and later, stood up the alchemists in Yusnaan who were gonna have me exterminate the Niblets, and left Gysahl Greens at Canopus for 30 hours. Got a 5-star rating on Caius because the only way I managed to beat him was by blowing my EP spamming Overclock and rushing him down before he fired off a second round of quadrelements.
> 
> Anyways, something that irks me about LR; the quest rewards are unreasonably biased -against- shields. Like, there are more free garbs than you could possibly put to good use in one playthrough. I usually just stick to the starting trio and Midnight Mauve. And free weapons are all over the place. But shields? Eight total. Your starters, one from Hope, one in a sidequest, and three Eorzean ones. Then, to reiterate a point I made in a previous work, Shiva gets annoyingly little in the Lightning Saga outside of the first game. I mean, yes, you could make the same point for all of the Eidolons except Odin and arguably Bahamut. But to me, it's MORE annoying that the Twin Sisters get a bunch of small bits in XIII-2 than if she had just been left behind. They had a pact with Lightning in Valhalla, give it a little more acknowledgement!
> 
> Two birds. Another stone.
> 
> The summary is my intention of the sidequest briefing when you're about to accept it. I would have this one become available after having completed Main Quests 2-3 (vs. Snow) and 3-3 (vs. Caius). It would be one of those 'talk to the right person and the quest is on, no choice to accept or refuse' quests, you know the kind.

"Somehow, the end result looks worse from this angle."

Lightning regarded the fallen statue as she stepped into the Augur's Quarter, the gates closing behind her. The firework-induced collapse had slammed the head(s?) of the statue into the wall around the Hero's Garden of the palace of Yusnaan, yet the wall had mostly held up well; there was enough breakage to form a staircase to the gap, but from the garden it had seemed no more devastating than a fallen tree. But here, from the purview of the audience or ground-level performers, it was clear how much damage had really been done - the statue had been torn off its foundation, pieces had scattered off, and it was not like to be standing again before Bhunivelze woke up.

As she made to step around the statue, someone caught her eye. Directly west of the statue's base, a portion of Augur's Quarter was draped in shadow - a tall structure on one side and a cart of sorts on the other left a segment unreached by the lights from either - and standing in those shadows was a woman with skin so pale it must not have seen sunlight since time had stopped. Her hair was bright silver, and long enough to flow down her back; she was dressed in rather tight clothing of silver and bright blue, and stood in a pair of rather tall heels.

She seemed concerned about something, and as Lightning approached her, she heard the woman muttering to herself.

"...your icy thrones. Come forth, sisters of winter wastes. ...your icy thrones. Come forth, sisters of winter wastes."

Lightning spoke up as she drew near. "Excuse me, are you alright?"

The woman glanced towards her - and Lightning saw something out of place. A patch of her skin, around her left eye and reaching back towards her ear, was so dark as to imply she had been born, raised, and seared upon the sands of the Dead Dunes. On seeing the savior, her eyes widened, and she turned fully to face Lightning. "You're..."

Lightning could scarce believe what she was seeing. "Y-You?"

"Please," the woman begged, stepping forward. "Help me. You have to help my sister."

"Of course," Lightning agreed without objection. "What happened?"

"She's gone missing, and hasn't returned," the woman replied. "She was last headed to the Slaughterhouse, in the Champion's Quarter."

"What were you two doing apart?" The unheeded thought left Lightning's mouth before she had fully formed it, and she shook her head. "I'll go find her," she promised.

The woman nodded, and Lightning dashed towards the Quarter gate. A tone rang in her ear as she scanned 'her' ID card on the gate, and Hope's voice came through. _"Uh, Light? Is something wrong?"_

"If by 'something wrong' you mean 'someone's in trouble', yes," Lightning replied.

 _"That's not what I meant,"_ Hope insisted.  _"You just... agreed to what she asked before she'd even said as much. Did you notice something I missed?"_

Lightning didn't respond.

* * *

"What do you think you're doing, talking like that?"

As she stepped into the vicinity of the Slaughterhouse, Lightning noticed something she rather wished wasn't there for her to notice - several figures in white hoods, brandishing rusty-gold sickles. Most of them appeared to be women, though she noticed a couple men towards the back. "Etro fanatics," she muttered. "The thought is the seed for the deed."

 _"What are the Children of Etro doing in Yusnaan?"_ Hope wondered.  _"How long have they been here?"_

"Let's worry about that when they're not here anymore," Lightning insisted, starting towards the group.

The fanatic at the lead was holding her sickle to a woman - rather scantily-clad, in all honesty - they had cornered against the monster-presentation cage. "You think you can just talk about the goddess' grace like it's some handout to the common masses?" she demanded. "Did you think there would be no retribution for such demeaning?"

Their victim said not a word, and Lightning quickly got the fanatics' attention with a loud "Hey!" As the hoods turned to face her, she reached for her sword. "If you've got a bone to pick, keep it out of the cold."

"Huh?" Sickles were raised. "It's her! The savior from the wanted posters?"

"Didn't they take those down already?" Lightning sighed.

The heretic at the lead turned to their victim for a moment before facing Lightning with a groan, raising her sickle. "Wicked savior, go now to Etro's side!"

"Death to the savior!" the fanatics jeered.

* * *

**Fanatic × 2**

* * *

**Fanatic × 3**

* * *

**Fanatic × 5**

* * *

  **Fanatic × 5**

* * *

"By the grace of Etro, twin rulers arise from..." 

As the last fanatic fell, Lightning stepped forward; her footsteps caused their victim, murmuring to herself, to raise her gaze. Her skin was so dark that not embarrassment nor fear could alter its hue, nor heat or cold that would threaten a life... save for a patch around her right eye, reaching down her cheek and up her brow, that looked so pale as to be unhealthy. Her hair was bright silver, and done up in a high tail; in one hand was gripped a silver shape that might have been sunglasses, or a visor for one who rode a vehicle at high speed.

On seeing Lightning, her eyes went wide. "It's you."

"I thought as much," Lightning observed. "Your sister sent me to find you."

"Yes, I had a feeling," the woman admitted. "Thank you for coming after me."

"She's in the Augur's Quarter," Lightning informed her. "Can you get there on your own?"

The woman glanced towards the ground. "I should hope that will be the last ill encounter I have in this city... but you've seen me at a disadvantage too many times."

Lightning shook her head. "I meant the ID gate."

A smile rose on the woman's face. "I can access the area myself," she assured Lightning. "I will hasten to her. Please, come find us."

"I will."

The woman departed the Champion's Quarter, and after a moment Lightning heard Hope ringing in her ear again.  _"How did you know that was who you were looking for?"_ he asked.  _"Light, she acted like she knew you. Do you know those sisters?"_

"Yeah," Lightning confirmed. "I'm fairly sure we have met. But that was... some time ago. And you never did get to know them before then."

_"I'm... not sure I follow you."_

Lightning started out of the Slaughterhouse area.  _After we met, Hope spent a long time hating Snow. And when it came to light, he regretted things. It makes sense that he'd try to push those memories away - and small details like this, they'd be forgotten._

* * *

By the time Lightning was back at the Augur's Quarter, the two women had reunited in the shadowy area.

The pale one was wearing the visor that her sister had been carrying, and as the savior approached, they turned to face her in unison. A dark-skinned woman with a patch of light around one eye; and a light-skinned woman with her eyes masked, a hint of darkness barely around the lower edge. The two acting in unison confirmed what Lightning had believed - she  **did** know these sisters, though not in these bodies, and as her footsteps slowed she could see phantoms of them as she remembered them, standing at each's side.

To be fair, Shiva had been among the more humanoid of Eidolons.

Stiria spoke first. "You recognized us, from the beginning."

"I had my suspicions, individually," Lightning admitted, "but seeing you together quelled any doubts. We did fight together."

"Yes," Nix confirmed, "and when that fight ended, it was for the worse. Valhalla merged with the mortal world, and we no longer had anywhere to exist as we once did."

"So, this, here - you two being in this form, in this city..."

"Indeed," Stiria confirmed. "We had two options - take new bodies, or exist in ephemerality. A powerful enough Chaos would let the ephemeral manifest - just for an instant - but it would not be enough, and we hoped that it would never exist."

Lightning glanced between them. "Snow," she realized. "You're here to watch over him."

Nix nodded. "He had been falling into despair. We would visit his palace for the nightly revels - blend among the crowd - but he would recognize us, if not consciously, and it would help lift his spirits, ever so little."

"Ever so little was enough," Lightning assured them. "You kept him from giving in. He lasted until I was there to pull him back from the brink. Thank you."

"Thank **you** ," the sisters said in unison. "It was an honour to fight the same fight once more."

* * *

_**QUEST COMPLETED** _

** ★ Savior's Reward **

**Gil Obtained: 3100 gil**  
**Winter's Wheel ×1**  
**Nix's Mask ×1**

**Maximum HP +150**  
**Strength +12**  
**Magic +16**

**Author's Note:**

> Don't think the gameplay rewards are enough to merit a chapter of their own this time, so I'm just gonna sum them up here. They weren't really enough to merit a chapter of their own LAST time, but I was just worried they'd surpass the character limit in combination with all I had to say afterwards.
> 
> Nix's Mask is an adornment. The plate that covers her eyes normally, plus the grating over her brow and the wings on the sides. The other prize is a shield that looks like the wheel she slings around in combat, and it's constantly spinning while Lightning wears it.
> 
> =Winter's Wheel=  
> A shield that holds within it the spirit of the Eidolon Shiva, the Twin Sisters who endure all together.  
> Maximum HP: 0  
> ATB Speed: +15  
> Guard Defense: 200  
> Magic: +120


End file.
